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I am doing some research for my 21 year old son who will be moving up to New Jersey short term in a couple months. I found this forum which seems real helpfull.
My son will be driving into West New York, NJ on weekends. Anywhere within about 45 minutes drive would be okay. Since he is from Virginia and will sometimes be driving back down here, somewhere south or southwest of West New York is best. I want to make sure he is living somewhere safe, prefer a suburban type area. He has a car and will be looking for a retail type job for during the week, so nearby malls would be good. He will be looking to rent a room or sublet in a house or apartment with off street parking preferred.
Areas I have seen mentioned that sound like they might be good are Weehawken, Summit, Chatham, Springfield, Milburn, Westfield, New Providence, Matawan. Comments on these? Other suggestions?
Really appreciate any help people can give me.
I would say go south a bit, not west like a lot of the towns you mentioned, staying relatively close to the NJ Turnpike for easy commuting both north and south, near the Princeton area (Plainsboro, South Brunswick, East Brunswick, maybe West Windsor). Will probably be a bit cheaper, definitely suburban and within driving distance to enough retail.
Thanks. Most of those places look on Mapquest to be more than an hour away though, and I really want to try to look for 30-45. He will drive back and forth from West NY, NJ a couple times each weekend and gas and tolls being what they are.......
Are you saying he'll be driving to WNY more than once a day? Wont be as much traffic on weekends so he can probably go a bit further south and still be within 45mins. Follow I-95 down and choose those areas like Woodbridge, Edison, Piscataway and E Brunswick if he wants to stay real close to WNY.
Luckyshoes selected towns a bit further but closer to VA when he travels home.
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I'd think about what the towns have in terms of entertainment, too. Westfield has a reasonably-sized downtown, but it attracts mostly people who are older, with kids. He might try going a little further East into Cranford or Garwood, assuming he might want to get to Hoboken where there is more twenty-something night life. (I haven't done it myself, but I think he could take the train and then PATH or something else). Having a train nearby is important, as I'm sure he'll want to go to the city--these towns are all on a train line.
Another thing to do would be to see where the bigger colleges are--there'll be plenty of people your son's age. (I'm thinking Rutgers and Seton Hall, the former of which is in New Brunswick (never been there, so you'll have to find out more), the latter in South Orange (only been to West Orange)). I'm making these suggestions because at his age, I would have been bored out of my mind where I live (Summit), and would have wanted more diversity and to be by some people who were in my age group. I still would like more diversity, but had to rent a place before getting to know the area.
He is going to be performing with a World WinterGuard ( I realize most reading this may have no idea what that is) which rehearses in West NY, NJ all day Saturdays and Sundays. So yes he could live in or near there, but from my reading on these boards it seems that this area is very expensive since its near NYC but also not a good area. In fact reading thse boards has given me a whole list of places that apparantly are not safe to live, including West NY, Jersey City, Union City, Irvington, Newark.
So looking at a map and reading the places listed as safe, kind of gave me some places that looked 30-45 minutes away.
He will be working during the week and will be busy rehearsing every weekend, so the social life thing is not real imposrtant.....but it would be nice for him to be able to have people his own age around. New Brunswick, where RU is, safe or not so much?
He could stay in lower Bergen County which is safe and close to enough to West NY. It would be about a 20 to 30 minute drive depending on traffic. Towns like Lyndhurst, North Arlington, East Rutherford, Carlstadt, Woodridge, Moonachie, Little Ferry and Wallington. These would all have some inexpensive options for rent and put in prime location to get to a retail job in either the shopping areas of Secaucus, Clifton or Paramus or any of the little stores in each town.
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